


Of Love and Sacrifice

by Raddd (RaddRebel)



Category: Naruto
Genre: Anbu Hatake Kakashi, Anbu Uchiha Itachi, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-26
Updated: 2019-04-26
Packaged: 2020-02-04 19:11:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18610726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RaddRebel/pseuds/Raddd
Summary: A story of Itachi Uchiha’s painfully short life, and his journey of unrequited love.Written for the May 2019 Armada prompt: Hanahaki Disease.





	Of Love and Sacrifice

It didn’t take a genius to know that Kakashi was a broken man. He had lost all of his teammates, in horrible ways. And he had lost his beloved teacher, along with his wife the night that the nine tails had been unleashed. It was well known that at 7 years old, the copy nin had walked in to find his own father’s corpse, still warm after death in their family home. The man was always a ticking time bomb, only letting off pressure when he shoved a chidori straight through an enemies chest. Despite being so young, he was already a legend, feared by all. Even his own Anbu subordinates were weary of him. 

When Itachi joined the ranks of Anbu, he was only eleven years old. He could feel the turmoil in the village, from his clan growing restless under the pressures of the village, and the narrowed gazes they all seemed to sense on their backs. He had a lot of responsibility put on his young shoulders, to be the eyes and ears for his father and the other elders. But just because he had things going on in his own life, did not mean that over the years of his Anbu service, he did not watch the other man, and contemplate his suffering.

On the way back from a particularly brutal mission that went sideways, Itachi found himself supporting the weight of his silver haired captain. Kakashi was chakra depleted from overusing the Sharingan, which hadn’t happened very often since the copy nin had mastered using the eye years before. A trickle of blood marred Kakashi’s pale face as the younger ninja set him down, propped against a tree and started checking his body over for more wounds. 

“Hound-San… we are within the borders of fire again, safer now. Is there anywhere that feels it needs medical attention before we continue ahead?” Itachi asked in a hushed tone, though they were basically safe now. Kakashi’s original eye cracked open and looked up at his fellow ninja leaning over him, and his head faintly shook a negative response. After Itachi acknowledged him, Kakashi allowed his head to slip down and his chin to rest against his own chest. His body slowly slackened and Itachi realized the other man had just passed out right in front of him. 

He felt a pang of sympathy and then gently began to lift the unconscious man up into a position against his chest that he could easily run back to Konoha in. Chakra depletion was a common thing with the younger Uchiha who had just activated their eyes and we’re reckless in their training. He was immensely impressed by the control over the Sharingan that Kakashi held, even though he was not an Uchiha. The copy nin indeed was a genius. As he ferried the elder Anbu back to the safety of their village, he couldn’t help but think about all the ways he could try to mend the broken man.

Itachi clutched Kakashi closer to his chest as he landed right outside of Konoha’s front gates. They were met by two other Anbu that were always stationed as support for the front gate, and Itachi spoke to them in hushed tones, explaining Kakashi’s condition to them. They escorted him to the hospital and as the silver haired Captain was whisked away from him, he felt a sharp pain in his chest. He staggered into the nearest wall and leaned against it as he tried to catch his breath, clutching his hand over his heart where the pain was emanating from.

“Crow-San are you alright?” One of the support Anbu was still by his side, and hesitantly gripped his arm at the elbow to help him stay upright. “Should I call a healer for you as well Crow-San?” Itachi blinked back tears of pain from his eyes under his mask and shook his head after a moment. He pushed himself up from the wall more and steadied his breathing.

“I’m fine Cat-San. I just got dizzy for a moment from carrying the Captain. Thank you for your concern.” He straightened his mask on his face and then turned away from the other Anbu, lifting his hand up forming the sign to teleport away. Before he did, he turned to Cat.

“Please send someone to let me know how Hound-Sans condition progresses. I’m going to report to Leader.” He didn’t wait for Cats nod, as he activated the jutsu and flashed away.

As the next year passed, Itachi was not able to hide his growing condition from the closest ninjas in his life. Coughing up blood and flower petals wasn’t exactly the easiest thing to hide. At first he had coughing fits that didn’t result in anything but a wheeze in his chest, and then it progressed onto hiding his bloody coughs in his black linen shirts. On a mission that took his team far from the village, into snow country, he really couldn’t explain a handful of bloody flower petals just showing up in his hands while they stood in a snowy desert.

“...Flowers haven’t bloomed in this land for over a hundred years.” Kakashi said a few minutes after Itachi had finished the latest round of coughing. The Uchiha slowly raised his eyes to meet his captains gaze, feeling as if looking at the other man was going to cause another coughing fit any second now. Kakashi’s gaze didn’t waver from his subordinates as he reached out and took the handful of petals from Itachi’s cold fingers.

“The medical nin can take care of this problem for you. Unless you can take care of it yourself before it kills you.” He said, taking stock of the blood stained aster’s and cherry blossom petals. He watched Itachi’s head shake in his peripheral vision, and it made him impulsively crush the flowers in the grip of his fist. “Do you want to die that bad, Crow?”

Itachi didn’t really have a response to that, but Kakashi didn’t actually want one either. His Captain dropped the crushed petals to the snow packed earth underneath them and continued on with their mission. A few days after they returned from the land of snow, Itachi was summoned before Danzō. He knew it was coming, it wasn’t as if his captain could just let him continue to put all of their missions in jeopardy. Itachi couldn’t decide if he had ever seen Danzo look so annoyed as he began to lecture his underling.

“If you are so set on keeping this useless, unrequited love, then we have another method of keeping this sickness at bay. One of our own medical Anbu will perform a procedure on you once a month to clear out all of the flowers from your lungs and heart, avoiding the ones rooted in the ventricles of your heart.” Danzo shook his head and looked even more disappointed in Itachi.

“I would force you to have it all removed, accept I don’t want to risk you also losing your memories. I’m sure it would be difficult to explain why you’ve lost every memory you’ve ever had with your team captain.” Danzo’s look was smug on his face as Itachi tried to school his expression into something that wasn’t utter shock. He hadn’t told anyone, yet his leader knew. He was truly a formidable shinobi if he could see that clearly into Itachi’s heart, one who was a genius at hiding his true self from everyone, even his closest relatives. He bowed his head to Danzo and made a sound of agreement.

“Thank you for your mercy, Danzo-Sama. I will diligently attend the procedure as often as it takes to continue with my duties to Konoha.” Itachi moved back into his upright position and awaited his dismissal. He was rewarded with one last smug look from Danzo, an order to meet with Cat-San who was apparently the medical nin who would be tending to his sickness, and then left alone in the room as Danzo teleported himself away.

The procedure was carried out immediately, after figuring out that Itachi’s sickness had already begun to take over his lungs and was dangerously close to creeping up his trachea. That explained why it was so hard to breathe these days. While the flowers were basically burnt from his lungs and from wrapping around his heart, he tried to distract himself from the excruciating pain. He imagined himself in a field of the flowers trapped in his lungs, and beside him was the object of his affection and vague obsession from over the years.

He wanted to pick all the broken pieces of Kakashi up and fit them back together. He wanted to erase the pain the man always endured at night and memories he sometimes relived during missions. Itachi had more than once caught the copy nin staring blankly at his hands, and then leave to wash them for over an hour. And when he came back, there would be a barely noticeable shake in those hands that Itachi imagined may still be soaked in blood in Kakashi’s mind. 

His eyes were squeezed shut by the end of the surgery, and his chest felt like it was on fire, and maybe just a little bit empty. The hands on his back moved away and a second later, moved a glass of water in front of Itachi’s face. “Drink this. It will hurt at first, but will make the pain less afterwards.” The glass wasn’t just water then, but some sort of pain reliever. Itachi drank it gratefully and then handed the cup back, taking a moment to steady himself before standing up to go.

“If you told him, you might not need me to remove vines from inside of your lungs anymore, Crow-San.” Cat said from behind him, startling the Uchiha. Was he just an open book for everyone to read, now? He straightened his spine and tugged at his Anbu gloves, pulling them back into place from where they had slightly shifted. He once again, had no clue how to respond to being called out by another. If these couple of people had figured out who it was, how had the copy cat, genius ninja not figured it out?

“If you know, then wouldn’t it be plausible to believe that he has already figured it out, and just does not love me back?” Itachi finally answered back, feeling a twisting in his heart that was most definitely the flowers rooted deeply there. Cat looked at the younger Anbu and cocked his head, surely a contemplative look on his face under his mask. He took so long to say something in response, that Itachi thought he didn’t have anything, and he was about to body flicker away.

“Maybe it is because, he does not see the way you look at him. Because you only look when he is not. But you seem to forget about others when you admire him.” Itachi blinked and blinked again at the Anbu medic, really not knowing what to say then. After a moment, he bowed and thanked the Anbu again, and then flickered away.

After months of the same treatments, Itachi was numb to the pain, and starting to contemplate actually telling his Captain. By the time he had worked up any courage though, change had come his way. Unwanted change.

“This is my last mission in Anbu.” Kakashi nonchalantly mentioned, as they ate around their camp fire. This mission was to be risky for all of them, and all Itachi could suddenly think about was ‘would Kakashi make it home, if this was his last mission’. He took a drink of water to help stave off a coughing fit that he could feel welling in his chest. After the feeling passed, he raised his cup to his Captain, and smiled a sad smile. “Then we better make it a good one.”

The mission went well, despite a few hiccups along the way. But what greeted Itachi when they came home, was much worse than hearing his Captain was leaving. His father had started plotting against the village. The coup was planned hastily to correspond with a time when the village would be most vulnerable. After the clan meeting, Itachi immediately reported to Danzo.

“If you truly want to serve this village, and protect everyone inside of it, you know what must be done.” Danzo stated, his voice cold as ice that chilled Itachi’s blood. 

“Sasuke will live. If I do this, you will promise that Sasuke will not be harmed, and will never be blamed for anything.” Itachi stressed his words, pulling his mask off of his face to reveal his blood red eyes to his leader. His eyes promised pain, death, and quite a bit of suffering, not in that order. Danzo inclined his head in agreement, and only the Anbu guarding his back would ever be able to testify that he had sighed in relief when Itachi flickered away.

Before the day of his final mission for Konoha came, Itachi found himself out in public, in civilian clothes. He wandered about the village, stopping by stalls and just savoring what he would be losing when he became a traitor to his beloved village. He could feel a vague ache in his chest from the flowers, but he had recently had them removed by Cat, so it wasn’t a problem yet. He caught a flicker of silver hair to his right and found Kakashi leaning against a tree, reading one of his favorite books.

“Kakashi-San. Would you mind taking a walk with me?” The silver haired man looked up at Itachi and slowly slid his book back into his belt pouch, pushing off of the tree he was leaning against to walk beside his former subordinate. They couldn’t talk about it publicly, but they both knew who the other was, in and out of the uniform. They walked in silence for a while, losing themselves in the market district of Konoha. 

“I wanted to thank you, for everything Kakashi-San.” Itachi finally said, keeping his eyes ahead of them on their path. The markets were slowly dwindling and turning into civilian housing. Kakashi turned his head and eye smiled, a slight crease forming in his mask where his mouth turned up.

“You don’t have to thank me Itachi-kun, I was doing my duty. It was my honor to keep one of konoha’s precious genius’ safe.” If it was possible, Kakashi’s eye turned up even more as his smile got bigger. He truly was a master at facial expressions, even with the mask on. Itachi smiled back, assessing his old team captain. The man had really begun to change. Maybe he wasn’t necessarily healed, it would take a lot longer and a lot more love to be able to say Kakashi was healed.

Itachi could feel the vines in his lungs twisting in response to the fact that he would not be the one to heal kakashi with the love he had harboured for years. He could feel sweat accumulating in his palms and clenched them together a bit as he thought about what he wanted to say. “I just really appreciate all of the times you had my back, and other times that you had good advice to give.” He looked up at the taller ninja, hoping his smile seemed genuine enough, but didn’t give his true feelings away.

Kakashi cocked his head to the side and scrutinized his younger counterpart. “You talk as if you’re going away on a very long mission, that you might not return from, Kohai.” He was a genius after all, and he could tell something was eating at Itachi. But he also knew that he would not be able to get the information out of Itachi no matter how much he pried. Itachi just smiled at him and continued walking down the road. Eventually, they parted ways, with barely audible goodbyes. And that was the last time Kakashi saw Itachi when he wasn’t a traitor to their village. 

The very next day, the Uchiha compound was bathed in blood, Sasuke was in the hospital, and Itachi was on the run. Kakashi connected the dots immediately. Figured out that he was the last person Itachi had reached out to just before masacreing his entire family, save his beloved baby brother. Kakashi was a part of the support team that cleaned up bloody weapons and moved countless dead bodies. The most disturbing thing out of it all to Kakashi, was the sprinkles of purple asters and pink cherry blossoms everywhere. 

Years later, Kakashi would be caught in Itachi’s genjutsu, reliving his death countless times. Years of pain from the Hanahaki disease had probably twisted Itachi just a little bit. Just enough that he could allow himself to hurt Kakashi this way. Distance from the copy nin had allowed Itachi to breathe a little bit, but he still had to find another way to remove the flowers from his lungs and around his heart every few months. 

Luckily being a part of a crime group full of the most resourceful rogue ninjas in the world had its perks. Itachi had only been near dead once during all of his years away from the village from the flowers over taking his system. If he had tortured kakashi by making him relive days of dying from the Hanahaki Disease in his genjutsu, that was between him and the copy nin, and no one else.

When Sasuke finally caught up to Itachi, his plan was falling into place. He had overused his eyes, and they were losing their light more and more every day. He used all of his strength to elevate his baby brothers strength. He fought hard, but not hard enough to kill Sasuke, because Itachi was dying anyways. Between his eyes fading, and the flowers crowding his lungs and constricting his heart, he would die very soon. And if he was going to die, he was going to do it making sure his brother had everything he possibly needed to defeat everything coming his way.

He played the villain until the very end, promising to rip Sasuke’s eyes from their sockets and take them for his own. He coughed up what seemed like buckets of blood, with whole flowers coming up his throat as he staggered toward his baby brother. Sasuke was depleted so much that he couldn’t keep his Sharingan activated anymore, but he continued throwing kunai and whatever else he could get his hands on at Itachi’s fading Susano’o. He backed Sasuke into a wall, and used the last of his strength to raise his shaking hand and tap his bloody fingers against his brothers forehead.

“Sorry Sasuke...this is the last time.” He breathed out on his last breath, a bloody smile on his face. And then his body hit the ground. And he was still. Pink and purple flowers pushed their way up through his chest, and stopped when they could feel sunlight on them. These flowers might take root in this very place and grow there forever, as a symbol of the love Itachi never revealed to his Captain. On top of being stunned that he had won, Sasuke stared down at his elder brothers body, becoming aware that his brother had harboured love for someone who had either not loved him back, or had never even known in the first place.

The flowers were the first of many mysteries he uncovered about his brother, finding out against Itachi’s will that he was not the traitor the village had painted him to be. Obito took in Sasuke and performed the proper burial rites for a dead Uchiha, though with some extra steps that Sasuke was too distraught to notice. Many tears were shed for his brother that he had lost, and he could feel Itachi’s blood on his hands. He was not able to gain any peace with his brothers death, until the fourth great ninja war was in full swing.

The Edo Tensei was an unnatural Jutsu, forbidden for very obvious reasons. But here stood countless reanimated ninja, who should be sleeping away their afterlives. Itachi was disoriented when he opened his eyes and found himself in a wood coffin. His eyes worked perfectly, and he couldn’t feel any of the pain in his chest that he had endured for over a decade during his life. When his coffin lid popped open and gave him freedom, he took stock of his surroundings. He was definitely under the influence of a jutsu that everyone else was. 

A great battle for mankind raged around him, and he could remember all of the plans Obito had set in motion. Now that he had been brought back, he had second chances for many things, and a genius such as himself would not squander those chances. After using shisui’s eye to break Kabuto’s control over him, he took action. Sending off a shadow clone for Kakashi may not have been the best course of action, straining his chakra pool, but he would not leave this plane of existence once more without finally telling the man he loved how he had felt for over a decade. 

While his main body took care of Kabuto and started the process of ending the Edo Tensei, he found the copy nin in a battle of his own. He watched as the copy ninja’s hand went straight through the chest of Momochi Zabuza one last time, and stabbed out the back. His words about wanting to protect the way Zabuza and Haku had died were full of emotion that Itachi hadn’t witnessed from the man before. A lot had definitely changed for Kakashi in the time that Itachi had left the village, and even more so after he had died. As the battle wound down for a moment, Itachi stepped forward a bit, alerting the copy nin of his presence. The flash of anxiety that ran through Kakashi’s eyes at the thought of now fighting one of his most formidable kohai was easily noticed.

“Kakashi-San, if you have a moment.” He said, hoping to diffuse the tension, showing that he was not currently being used as a tool in the grand scheme of things. A Nara soldier stepped closer to Kakashi and whispered in a hushed tone. “General? Are we fighting the Uchiha..?” Kakashi stares at Itachi before shaking his head no and directing the questioning soldiers back behind him. “No, he is a friendly, and we have something to discuss. Quickly.” Kakashi could hear the clangs of metal on metal from a battle that was beginning some distance behind them, but he moved closer to Itachi for this conversation. 

“Our time is precious Itachi, so speak.” He answered, his mismatched eyes meeting Itachi’s black and red ones. Itachi could feel a flutter in his heart, not unlike how he always felt when getting near Kakashi during his time living. He nodded his head and didn’t let himself hesitate with what should have been said many times in the past. Itachi locked eyes with the silver haired General, to make sure the man was paying attention, and to memorize all of the reactions that would be had.

“Since before joining Anbu, I had heard stories of the great copy ninja, Kakashi. The one who “stole” Obito-sans eyes and the one who killed his other teammate in cold blood.” Itachi could see the tension at Kakashi’s eyes, and the thin line that formed where his mouth was behind his mask. “ Whispers of the death of your father and his disgrace always followed. When I met you in Anbu, I did not take much stock in what others had said, and quickly found that I admired you. And I could tell how broken you were.” Itachi could see a change in the others eyes and his posture loosening.

“Every mission drew me closer to you, until one day a pain in my chest almost drove me to my knees. And I knew what it was. But you’re a genius, and I thought that maybe you knew and just didn’t feel the same.” Kakashi’s eyes had grown a bit wide, probably looking back at all the instances he had seen Itachi cough up flowers and blood and try to hide it. Kakashi may have been a genius, but he was also an idiot, blinded by his own pain. His hand had begun to lift towards Itachi, but the younger man started speaking again, and he froze.

“I lived my life to strengthen Sasuke, and make sure he could defeat all of his enemies who crouched in wait. I knew I would die, and I let it happen. But I regret never telling you how much I loved you, Kakashi-San. Even with the possibility of you not returning my feelings. I wanted to fix your brokenness with my love. And in another life, maybe we could have been happy together.” Itachi’s mouth was getting dry from all of the words he was saying. And as he watched Kakashi’s face react to his words, he knew that the man might have loved him back, if only he had said the words.

“But now I see that someone else’s love has already begun to mend your broken parts. I’m going to assume it’s those kids you’ve helped turn into fine ninja to defend our village. They aren’t half bad.” He smiled sadly, and noted movement from enemies somewhere behind Kakashi’s shoulder. He lifted his hand to rest it against Kakashi’s masked cheek, and smiled the purest smile he could muster for the man that would always hold his heart.

“My original is working on a way to negate this forbidden jutsu, so just hold on until then, Kakashi. I’m sorry I had to tell you these things in the middle of a battlefield. But I could not let myself pass from this world again, without telling you.” He leaned forward and pressed his forehead to Kakashi’s, smelling blood and sweat on the others skin. As they stared into each other’s eyes, Itachi knew that Kakashi harbored at least a little bit of love for him. And that made everything just a little easier to handle, as his body dissipated and the memories returned back to his original’s mind. Itachi smiled to himself as he enacted the final part of his plan to put an end to the Edo Tensei.

“Goodbye Kakashi.”

**Author's Note:**

> When I started writing this story, it was only meant to be short and to the point. But as you can see, it got away from me. I enjoyed writing it, and hope you enjoyed reading. This is the first fanfiction I have written since 2012, so bare with me haha. Any comments or feedback is very much appreciated! ❤️


End file.
